


i could never follow

by quakenbake (raccoontitties)



Series: Dixie Chicks Serious [1]
Category: Pitch Perfect (2012)
Genre: F/F, First Time
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-04
Updated: 2013-02-04
Packaged: 2017-11-28 04:48:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,146
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/670443
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/raccoontitties/pseuds/quakenbake
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eventually, Chloe becomes hers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i could never follow

**Author's Note:**

> This story is almost compliant with the other Chaubrey I've done. It comes first chronologically and is a pseudo companion piece to Under Pressure. Not-so-loosely inspired by The Long Way Around by the Dixie Chicks.

Aubrey is on campus for approximately ten minutes before she finds herself wondering why she thought this was a good idea. Barden University looked pretty and enticing in the website pictures and on the tour, but standing here amidst the crush of other new students swarming with stacks of boxes and exhausted parents trying find their assigned dorms, she's getting a sinking feeling in her stomach.

These people aren't like her. Not at all. A smattering of foreign languages drifts over from a cluster of international students. None of them speak Spanish, which sucks because she aced it in school and became nearly fluent during a semester exchange. Another group tosses frisbees in the quad, clearly unconcerned about the serious disruption they pose to the move-in process. It’s not charitable to say, but at least half of them need a shower and a haircut. She's going to have to make friends with these people as Aubrey, not as Lt. Colonel Posen’s daughter. There won't be a fixed unit of acquaintances like back at the high school on post where it's a given that she’ll associate with Major so so’s son and Lieutenant what's his name’s daughter. This is different. For the first time, she's without a tether. Unrestricted but also ungrounded, just randomly floating in space.

It's terrifying for a moment. For the moment that she _lets_ it terrify her. Then she squares her shoulders and looks out confidently over the quad, every inch her father’s daughter. She wanted this. A place where she can finally do what she wants and not worry about restrictions or her family’s reputation. Sure, this is completely new, but if she wanted familiar, she could have gone to UNC. It’s her parent’s alma mater and where many of her classmates ended up. She could have applied to West Point like her brother. But no, she chose Barden because it would be _hers_.

Her father finally catches up from where he and her mother parked the car. He juggles a couple of the lighter boxes in his arms as he surveys the campus with a critical eye. His jaw twitches and she can tell he doesn't like the chaos either. Aubrey halfway expects him to start barking commands and ordering the mass of people to queue up properly, but he just looks down at her with a tight smile and asks,

“Ready?”

Is she ready? That's the question. The one she's been debating for the past few minutes. It takes her less than a second to respond.

“Yes, sir.”

\----

Aubrey is prepared for a lot of things. She’s a Girl Scout _and_ she won the Gold Award. But she’s not prepared for the girl down the hall.

The first glimpse is a mass of red hair. The hallway of their dorm was designed to let in the maximum amount of natural light and as such has a lot of windows. The girl is bent over her doorknob trying to force her key into the lock. The sunlight catches in her hair and it’s blinding at first, but then shifts as she gets closer and mellows into this warm burnished glow that Aubrey just wants to reach out and touch. She catches herself before she randomly goes off feeling up strangers like a freak and is seconds away offering to help when the girl manages to muscle the door open. Red, as Aubrey calls her in her head, slips inside. Even though she leaves the door ajar, like a lot of the new students do to encourage people to drop by and say hi, Aubrey doesn't. The moment has passed. Now it would just be awkward  

She often sees Red around campus. Her name is actually Chloe and their schedules align so that one always comes as the other goes. On one hand, it kind of sucks because they never get a chance to talk. Chloe seems very nice from what Aubrey has observed of her interactions with other people on their floor. But on the other hand, she always gets to see that hair in the early autumn sunlight. It's still just as breathtaking, but now it's combined with eyes so blue that Aubrey can only think of the lagoon she swam that one summer the family went to Greece. The water was so clear that she'd dived straight in and never wanted to get out.

\----

College is both easier and harder than Aubrey expected. Classes are easy. She hasn't gotten less than an A since that one time in sixth grade when her presentation on James A. Polk as the greatest president in history fell a little flat. They really shouldn't assign open-ended projects if they already know what answer they want. In any case, making a routine is  simple: running in the morning before class, juggling various study groups after. She signs up for the Bellas, the premier acapella group on campus. She likes that they stand for female empowerment and that they know it’s appropriate to wear stockings with skirts. She likes the firm and commanding presence the group presents as a unit and though she will never admit it to her father, she absolutely loves the uniforms. 

It's at auditions that Aubrey finally talks to Chloe after two weeks of quietly observing her. Or rather, Chloe comes up and introduces herself to Aubrey, settling on a hug instead of a handshake and getting her lavender perfume all over Aubrey's shirt. It smells like that for the rest of the day and Aubrey can't pinpoint exactly why that makes her happy. It doesn't matter anyway because Chloe decides they should be friends. Aubrey doesn’t argue. She calls the next day and they hang out everyday for the rest of the week.

\----

Chloe coaches her on her ‘social awkwardness’. Apparently honesty really isn’t the best policy because telling people what she really thinks of them does not help her make friends. She takes a few of Chloe’s elbow jabs to her side, and learns to think a few seconds before she speaks. It works, sort of. She gets better at fitting in, but she still doesn’t really like going to parties without Chloe. That’s OK. She goes and pretends to drink but really just makes sure the person Chloe goes home with at the end of the night doesn’t look like a serial killer. The guys in Sigma Nu know not to even try at this point.

Aside from the Bellas, which is more about winning than making friends, Aubrey is most comfortable with the guys that who occasionally drop by Chloe’s room. College football is serious business in her house and this seems like the one area in which people appreciate her ‘fanatic competitiveness’. Aubrey can rattle of the scores of SEC championship games going back the last ten years. That makes her a huge hit with jocks like Tom. Chloe thinks it’s cute because she isn’t part of the culture and refuses to try to matter how many games Aubrey makes her sit through. She smiles tugs on the braid Aubrey wears for game day. (There’s no way she’s getting face paint in her hair) Aubrey frowns at her, but also she doesn’t really mind when she wraps it around her fingers and plays with it after she inevitably gets bored.

Being friends with Chloe is like being friends with some magical psychic creature. She’s everything Aubrey needs at any given time. It’s Chloe who helps her stage elaborate pranks on the Treblemakers, who tackles her in excitement when she gets her first solo, babbling about how proud she is. Aubrey can still remember how pleased she’d been to actually hear those words out loud and have someone mean them. It’s Chloe who tells her when she’s freaking out too much.

Eventually, Chloe becomes hers. 

\----

It doesn’t shock her when Chloe suggests she ‘get laid’. Some fratboy docuhenozzle had told her the same thing in much cruder words. What surprises her is the warm press of Chloe's lips against hers. She tastes like coffee and Baileys, probably from the Baileys-flavored creamer she loves, but with Chloe you can never tell. It all kind of clicks when Chloe runs her tongue along Aubrey's bottom lip and then up into her mouth. Then Aubrey goes from clutching her wrists in shock to finally finally running her hands through that silky hair that looks like it should burn but instead is smooth as silk.

This is what she needs.  Why she feels that extra jolt when Chloe hugs her. This is what she needs.  

Chloe's hands move from her jacket, one to squeeze gently at her waist and the other along her neck. Fingers tilt her jaw down to get a better angle. Aubrey can't seem to loosen the grip of her fingers in Chloe's hair to make her own explorations, but she doesn't mind. The warmth of Chloe's front pressed against her along with the tongue flicking against her teeth is more than enough to overwhelm her senses.

When Chloe pulls back and grins at her, she feels warm inside. Like that first long sip of hot chocolate where she can feel the path it makes down her throat. She smiles back and let's Chloe pull her down to sit on the bed. She leans in and connects their mouths again. Her hands her bold now, but Chloe's are bolder and it’s not long before she’s panting into the kiss. She's not a virgin so she knows what that feeling, the heat rising and settling low in her core, means. But she's also never been with a girl and doesn't exactly know how this works.

The hand under her shirt tweaking her nipple slows like it can sense her unease. Instead of pulling back, which Aubrey really doesn't want yet, it flattens over the curve above her bra and settling above her heart. It's almost definitely obvious how fast her pulse is pounding; she can feel it beating in her head.

When she catches her breath she looks up. Chloe watches her wearing a combination of her concerned face and her 'you're cute' face. There is nothing solicitous about the way her eyes have darkened, though. Her eyes are like a predator’s and that combination comforts Aubrey yet intensely arouses her at the same time. There's a question hanging between them, but its not clear who is asking what. Chloe kisses her cheek like she always does and that simplifies things. She stays with her mouth at Aubrey's ear and whispers,

"This is your call."

When faced with the decision to take something that her body is fairly screaming for or to back down because she's nervous, it's no competition. She is a Posen. More importantly, she wants this. She wants Chloe. She initiates the kiss this time and coaxes Chloe's tongue back into her mouth. The resulting moan gives her enough confidence so that when Chloe leans forward, Aubrey falls back the rest of the way and pulls Chloe with her.

Hovering over her, Chloe removes Aubrey’s shirt and bra before quickly dispensing with her own. Aubrey traces the smattering of freckles with her eyes and then with gentle brushes of her fingers because the way Chloe is straddling her means her hands can wander as they will. She's still transfixed by the smooth expanse of skin when she feels her jeans being pushed down. She's wet, so very wet that she can smell it and Chloe can definitely see it. Her panties go next and she wants to be self conscious but the way those perfect blue eyes gaze down at her make leave no room for anything but absolute trust.

Chloe nudges her legs apart and traces up and down her thigh. Each touch grows firmer than the last but none is firm enough or where she wants it. She knows that Chloe's knows what to do so she yanks her eyes away from the dusky nipples rising and falling so tantalizingly with Chloe's every breath.

For the first time, Chloe looks hesitant. She bites her lip and looks into Aubrey's eyes, searching.

"Are you sure?"

Aubrey has never been more certain of anything in her life. Slides her hand to the nape of Chloe's neck and grips the curls there.

“Yes, please.”

Those steady fingers finally make firm contact and she can't stop herself from canting her hips upward. Chloe starts slowly but increases her pace until Aubrey writhes beneath her and her moans have no place to go but into Chloe's waiting mouth. Fingers stroke down and tease her entrance before sliding inside. Chloe pumps into her once, twice, three times before Aubrey screams her name and seizes around her. Chloe brings her down with gentle strokes and fleeting kisses.

They fall asleep like that, with Aubrey sated and Chloe wrapped in her arms.


End file.
